Black Friday Falters as Consumer Behaviors Change
- 8 years ago
In 1939, the nation's largest retailers sent Franklin D. Roosevelt an urgent plea.
"It definitely matters so much less than it's mattered in the past," said John J. Canally, chief economic strategist at LPL Research.
But contrary to doom-and-gloom predictions this holiday season, dwindling sales for the long Thanksgiving weekend do not necessarily signal a cautious consumer.
Overall consumer spending since the beginning of 2014 has risen at a rate of 3 percent after lackluster gains in 2012 and 2013, and most stores rack up decent profits, on an earnings per share basis, during their holiday quarter.
The history of Black Friday tracks the history of modern American retailing, and of personal consumption in the United States, which makes up a bigger part of the economy than in almost any other industrialized country.
That discounting escalated by leaps and bounds in the dismal years after the housing boom collapsed and Lehman Bros.'s failure ushered in a global financial panic.
"It definitely matters so much less than it's mattered in the past," said John J. Canally, chief economic strategist at LPL Research.
But contrary to doom-and-gloom predictions this holiday season, dwindling sales for the long Thanksgiving weekend do not necessarily signal a cautious consumer.
Overall consumer spending since the beginning of 2014 has risen at a rate of 3 percent after lackluster gains in 2012 and 2013, and most stores rack up decent profits, on an earnings per share basis, during their holiday quarter.
The history of Black Friday tracks the history of modern American retailing, and of personal consumption in the United States, which makes up a bigger part of the economy than in almost any other industrialized country.
That discounting escalated by leaps and bounds in the dismal years after the housing boom collapsed and Lehman Bros.'s failure ushered in a global financial panic.